Filed under: Essays — chapters @ 2:36 PM
Don’t forget to click on the photographs to see the lights going out. I also switched off my flat’s lights on 28th March from 8.30 PM to 9.30 PM. But this photo series does not include my flat’s pics 
On another note, it is a revolutionary step taken. We should co-operate with such things.
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Funny!!!, craps ..., uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 2:03 PM
Isn’t it the last and the best day of the month? After all, one more month got over. It always feels refreshing that from tomorrow onwards another new day, new month will start and I will get another chance to take a monthly resolution, ahem… obviously to be broken before the month ends 
. And another good (read as actual) part of the last day of the month is, it is the day when the salary is credited to my account. 
You know, somehow, I have become miser these days. Since last one year, I was planning to buy a laptop. Last year I shifted to a flat alone and it made a big vacant space in my pocket, with security deposits and all. Then came the insurance premiums, tax deductions. So I dropped the idea of the laptop for the time being. Throughout the year, meine paai paai joda hai yaar. Now I had decided that I would book the lappy last weekend and when the salary is credited, I will pay the full amount and bring home my brand new lappy. But then I thought, agar itna din wait kar hi lee then kuch aur din bhi kar leti hun…. So the “buying-a-laptop” plan has been postponed till next month. See… I say that I am becoming a miser day by day 
I would give you one more example… Would you believe if I say you that I avoid auto rickshaw and come by bus to save 1 buck? Yes you heard it right… just 1 buck. Now you understand what actually “paai paai jodna” means.
I am afraid, soon my name will be enlisted in Wikipedia’s Famous misers in history. There are 6 names till now. The day the seventh name appears you know whom to call up and congratulate for such fame.
One more example you would automatically notice when you see me. I was God gifted, since my birth; with a pair of eyebrows much similar to kroor singh (I hope people watched “chandrakanta“, the Hindi lovestory which used to come on National television long time back). The left brow starts from left end of my forehead and much before it stops, the right one starts and goes on till the right end of my forehead (miles to go before I sleep…miles to go before I sleep; Robert Frost wrote this when he got inspired by my brows!!!). So, I need to visit the parlor regularly (atleast once in every month) to bring those bushy pair of brows into proper shape. I admit, it is a physical torture when someone uproots thick hairs from your forehead, just above your eyes with a piece of string. It hurts like anything. Tear start rolling down from my eyes the instance the first hair is pulled out. Sometimes, after just one brow gets into shape, I feel like jumping out of the chair and running away from the torture-chamber; no more strength to go through the same things again for the other one, which is still in full grown form; don’t worry, never did that actually . But from few months, I am avoiding going to parlor… I need to save “paai paai” you remember!! So my eye-brows are, once again, inspiring many poets of this era to write something new these days. And guess what, last Saturday, I met I~)’s Mom for the first time. I think, she is gonna reject me… I won’t complain; After all, who on this earth will accept a lady kroor singh as her daughter-in-law???
So it is almost proved, that I am a Kanjoosh… makhhi choooooosss.
**********
By the way, I started “The Sky Is Falling” by Sidney Sheldon yesterday at about 9 PM. And by 3 AM today morning I was left with some 80/90 pages. But decided to sleep. The first thing in the morning (at about 7.30 AM) I did was finishing the book. Felt good after such a long time. No, the book was not that good… just Okay. I loved other books of SS like Tell Me Your Dreams & If Tomorrow Comes. But I re-discovered my reading habit once again. I was missing it seriously.
Filed under: Behind the screen..., craps ..., uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 2:40 PM
Sometimes, I feel as-if everybody expects something more from me, someone better than me. My parents expect a better daughter, my brother expects a better sister, my bhabhi expects a better sis-in-law, my niece expects a better nana, my friends expect a better friend, my company expects a better employee, my teammates expect a better colleague, I~) expects a better life partner, my land lady expects a better tenant, my kaamwaali expects a better employer, my neighbors expect a better neighbor… the list goes endless.
At that point of time, I wish to have the power to search such a person who meets all the expectations. Then I would replace myself with her; happily give her my room keys, my office seat, my already reserved tickets to my hometown for the future. I would just run away from here. I, definitely, would not give her my bank account details as I cannot actually part with the small amount of money I have. That’s my hard earned money… arey itna daan nahi kar sakti yaar, dusre kisi jagah jake mein khaungi kya… pathhar??? . For 1 or 2 months I guess that much will be enough for me to live. Then I would look for some other job. Though I am not sure of getting any job at this recession time, but I would try. If my luck shines and I land up on some other job, then I would like to live the rest of life over there as I don’t think that anybody would be missing me here. Everybody here would have someone better than me and would be, most importantly, CONTENT.
Filed under: Behind the screen..., Down the memory lane..., Family..., uuphh yeh life!!! — chapters @ 6:36 PM
It just rained here in Kolkata… a heavy shower. And feeling like eating a home-made cake… I am longing for the aroma of a cake being baked in the old-fashioned bakers, (I am talking about the pre-microwave era.). Remember, the baker which looked like a small spaceship, made of steel, a power chord coming out of its side and with the lead having a circular transparent glass piece on its top so that we can see the cake being baked. When the cake swells, the semi-burnt but sweet aroma can be smelt in the house, sometimes in the neighbor’s house too. 
Bou used to make cake once or twice in every month. And that day both, my brother and me, would linger near the oven. Sometimes, it is an orange flavored cake, which was made by adding some Rasna, or actual orange pulp to the batter. I liked them either way. They were so yummy.
Then I started making cakes, with Bou’s recipes plus some impatience. First 3/4 times it was a mess. Either it was over-cooked and tasted like a burnt charcoal and sometimes it never puffed up.. just a hard and un-chewable piece. As humans learn from their mistakes, I learnt from the bad tastes of those cakes made by me. I started to stick to the ratio of Flour, Butter, Sugar, Baking powder, Milk, Flavors etc as in Bou’s recipe and voila… it was an instant hit. Once I got the ratio thing clear, I started experimenting with the flavors… I tried chocolate, then carrots etc… Then added some secret( ) ingredient told by a friend to make the cake fluffier.
One of my friends (let me call her by a name as I am going to refer her many times in this blog as she is one of my very close friends… say Raju… she is famous by this name in our friend circle.), Raju, found the cake so tasty that she told her mother about it. And the day I went to her house, there were atleast 5 ladies, including her mother and her neighboring aunties, who were enquiring me about the cake recipe. I felt so good… good about the tasty cake and the fame I was getting as a good baker.
By that time we had a microwave at my home. The first time I made a cake in the microwave, it came out to be, once again, a disaster. The cake, when in the microwave, was huge, but as soon as it was cooled down it started to become flat like a pan-cake. Then it was almost going to make for the “Hardest cake ever baked” competition. Then came the days when I mastered the cake baking art in the microwave too.
But here, I have neither the microwave nor the oldie baker. I cannot have a slice of the home-made cake anymore. I have decided, the next time I go home, I will bake a cake for myself.
By the way, now my team members are planning for a shared pizza party. Going to pacify my taste buds with the hot slice of a veg pizza now…
Filed under: Poems????, craps ... — chapters @ 1:12 PM
No, I don’t miss you anymore,
It’s just that I stopped
Laughing my heart out,
And never ventured near the place
Where you bade me goodbye
And, I don’t cry anymore.
No, I don’t cry anymore,
It’s just that I stopped
Writing poems,
And never read all those poems
I wrote when you were with me
And, I don’t love you anymore.
No, I don’t love you anymore,
It’s just that I stopped
Breathing long ago,
And I never smelt those flowers
You gave me as the farewell gift
And, I don’t miss you anymore.
